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Comment by lowtto | Hacker News Reader

WSL2 is essentially just.. Windows + Linux. I tried it and it is awesome. Cannot wait to see further progress that comes out of this. I really cannot leave Windows to be honest. The network effect is too strong. Coupled with recent Microsoft effort such as Visual Code, its looking like they are doing nothing but going towards the better direction than the old days. Who would have thought. Would you believe it if anyone said this to be the case, 10 years ago?

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> I really cannot leave Windows to be honest. The network effect is too strong.

I suspect whatever's keeping you on Windows isn't really the network effect. It's usually: comfort level/personal preference, or a set of software that vendor(s) can't/won't port to another non-Windows platform.

The fact that so many applications have been rewritten as browser-accessible services has liberated me. I haven't owned a system with a Microsoft OS since ~2004 or so.

Don't forget corporate policy. I would do all of my work on linux except I am barely allowed.

Tools like teams and outlook are also just not as good on Linux, and really important for work.

> or a set of software that vendor(s) can't/won't port to another non-Windows platform.

Is that not the network effect? I.e. everyone uses Windows so developers target their software for Windows, so everyone uses Windows?

I was also amazed with WSL, it genuinely made me think I didn't have to leave Windows anymore. It is honestly one of the best products Microsoft has launched recently. The development tools division of Microsoft is on fire and should be commended.

The Windows division is another story though. With all the Windows 11 news I decided to give desktop Linux a spin for the nth time in 20 years. Installed Manjaro and I'm extremely impressed. Even though I have Nvidia graphics everything is buttery smooth, all my productivity tools are there, setting up my VPN was far easier than Windows, and even more amazingly most of my games work well thanks to the recent push by Valve and the steam deck.

I will probably stick with it this time, so maybe for me 2021 finally is the year of the Linux desktop.

Dual boot? This does look slick, I was an avid WSL user until I started dual booting. Now I almost never need to boot to Windows.

I get that if you often need to switch it can be a pain in the ass but at least Linux respects my privacy and freedom.

Same situation here. Dual-booting Linux and Windows 10, and I figured I'd boot into Windows often enough for it to get obnoxious. But I only ever get on there to play a few demanding games (which I already don't play often anymore), or make music with an A+ DAW for making music that doesn't run super effectively on Wine. Linux handles everything else I do like a champ.

A friend of mine has been complaining that a DAW is the only thing keeping him stuck in Windows at this point as well. In his case, he specifically said that VST's were the problem. Was your experience the same?

Bitwig is a very good DAW with native Linux support. It's made by former Ableton devs so it definitely leans in that direction, but it works pretty well for other types of workflows too, especially with the recently released version 4.

VSTs are definitely an issue; most high quality commercial plugins are still only released for mac/windows. However there are a few projects for running them in wine and it generally works pretty well.

I do think we'll see more and more Linux in studios going forward, but it would help if Linux got its pro audio story together. Pipewire is a big step in the right direction but not yet mature.

Yep, for me it's the DAW and VSTs that keep me needing Windows for now. You can try to make them work with Wine or whatever, but it's not worth the hassle.

As the author of EasyBCD, I can tell you that interest in dual-booting has collapsed to near zero over the past decade.

How much of that effect do you think is due to recent Windows versions not playing nicely so you still get some hassle anyway and/or to improving options to run Windows virtually on a Linux host with close to native performance and compatibility?

What do you mean by "not playing nicely". With UEFI boot you can dual boot all day. There is no need to modify MBR. So nothing gets overwritten on updates.

I didn't say dual booting was itself the source of the danger (though it is true that in days gone by that was also a source of problems).

The issue I had in mind was the unrestricted hardware access that Windows has if it is running natively. This is an operating system that has literally pushed updates that inadvertently deleted user data, among other severe problems, and that will deploy its updates automatically to many users. Dual booting won't ensure the integrity of your system against that kind of threat. Running Windows in a virtual environment means it can't damage the rest of your system even if it deploys a seriously broken update without warning. And that kind of virtualisation is getting more practical all the time even if for now it remains the preserve of serious Linux hackers.

Anecdata, but I used to dual boot, until Windows mucked up the Linux boot more than once. Didn't play nice. So I run Windows in a VM now, it's not getting near the boot sector again.

Yep. I have a strict "Dual boot on dual drives" policy now because Windows thinks its too precious.

It only played to their disadvantage, for machines with single storage device now doesn't boot Windows at all or only from VM.

> Would you believe it if anyone said this to be the case, 10 years ago?

To be honest, Microsoft astroturfers have long existed, for much more than 10 years.

> Coupled with recent Microsoft effort such as Visual Code

Which is officially supported on Linux.

There might be reasons to run Windows, but this is not one :)

I think hes referring to how you can run the VSCode GUI in Windows but develop on WSL because they built an integration. It's pretty neat. And most people are using Windows for other reasons (drivers, gaming ,etc), this just makes development not a pain anymore.

> its looking like they are doing nothing but going towards the better direction than the old days

https://rentry.co/areweweloveopensauceyet

"awesome"

It's about the culture. Windows doesn't respect your privacy and you are treated like a child, because most people who run Windows wants Microsoft to make all decisions for them, just like a parent.

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